yami_samuraiflo | I'd like to go to a theme park...

This summer, I would really like to go to a theme park. I never had the occasion to as a kid, and my experience is limited to a trip to Bellewaerde with my brothers and my cousins when I was 15-16 years old.
I always wanted to do it again, but I never managed to for various reasons. I'd like to correct that.

Unfortunately, it might not be quite as easy as I'd like.
Problem number one is getting the authorisation (coughsmoneycoughs) from my parents. Though they do want us (my sister and I) to enjoy ourselves and be happy, anything having to do with amusement and trips away from home isn't at the top of their budget. And entries in most parks are pricy, so I first need to win that battle.
Problem number two is choosing a park. Though there aren't that many in France and most of them are at the other end of the country and as such, hard to join unless we make a road trip (which is more than unlikely), there're still a few we could try to go at. My sister and I don't quite agree yet on which one we should go if we could.

For me, by order of personnal preference, it would be:

- Disneyland Paris
- Bellewaerde (Belgium)
- Parc Astérix (near Paris)
- Nigloland (near Troyes)

All have pros and cons, though.

Disneyland is a childhood dream, for example, but it isn't very cheap. On the right side, it isn't too hard to join the park from my brother's appartment in nothern Paris - about one hour using public transports.

Ditto with Parc Asterix; it's near enough Paris that we could go and sleep at my brother's and use public transportation or the car to go there. On the down side, the park has been know to have some 'insecurity problems'; they're mostly caused by young suburbs-dwellers who roughs up the tourists. Officialy, the park took measures against that, but I don't know...

Bellewaerde, in Belgium, is actually far closer to us; less than 1h30 by car, and the entry is cheaper than at Disney or Asterix. But as much as I wouldn't mind going back there, I'd like to try something else.
Speaking of Bellewaerde, after going on their website, I was saddened to learn they had closed the 'Los Piratas' dark ride to replace it with a new roller coaster. Honestly, it struck a cord; 'Los Piratas' had been the first ride I ever went on, and I had really liked it. I had been hoping to do it again if we went bakc. =(

Last possibility would be Nigloland, a park I'm not familiar with; I just learned its name and location recently. The rides there seem nice enough on paper, but Troyes is farther away than Paris; the trip would take 3h30, meaning the best solution to go and enjoy the park would be to take a hotel room for a day or two. And I don't know if my parents would agree.

Tough choice.
Problem three is, when to go? If we go now in June, we should encounter less people that in July or August (or at least I hope so). As we'll be going to Japan Expo at the start of July, I'm kinda hoping we could stay in Paris a few more days, so we could go to a park and perhaps visit a museum or two. Not to forget we'll get my nephew and niece two weeks in July and two weeks in August, and they're far too little yet to go to a theme park. Though I've half in mind to see if we couldn't take them to Paradisio... or rather, Pairi Daiza, now. The local zoo wouldn't be bad either, if we can't...

Anyway.

If we plan a trip to Bellewaerde or Disney or Asterix, I've been thinking about inviting my sister's friends to come with us; it would certainly be nicer with other people. Most of them haven't finished with their end-of-the-year exams yet though, so it will have to wait a few more weeks. Especially since my sis also need to finish her 'rattrapage' (secondary exams because she didn't manage to validate her years with her first series) and she doesn't have the dates of all of them yet.

I really hope we'll manage. :)